Dear Prudence,
I am a professional woman with a demanding job and a baby. I always
figured that after starting a family I'd hire a house cleaner, just as
my mother had done. We have the income to do this but my husband objects
to this idea. He has listened to my argument that paying a cleaner
would give us more quality time with our child and each other, but he
says it makes him feel more loved to know that I have cleaned our
bathroom myself. He is happy to do his share of the housework and
doesn't want me to contract out my share to a stranger. I don't know if
some women feel a kind of love for their husbands that best finds
expression through scrubbing toilets, but, as it turns out, I don't. I
am tempted to secretly hire a cleaner for a few hours each week with my
own money and pretend I've done the cleaning myself. Would this be
wrong?

—Maid to Order

Dear Maid,
I'm surprised that by now your husband hasn't found out where you'd most
like to insert the toilet brush. I'd have an easier time understanding a
husband who wants to freshen up his marriage by bringing someone
wearing a French maid costume into your bedroom for a threesome than a
husband who objects to a hiring a housekeeper to freshen up the
bathroom. He certainly has a unique view of connubial intimacy. In your
husband's world, nothing beats your lovingly wiping away his failed
attempts to aim his urine stream and scrubbing away his streaks. If I
had a husband with ideas like yours, I'd be temped to move into my own
place where I could hire some household help without hearing a load
about how a domestic employee with a johnny mop is a violation of the
marital bond. Do not engage in toilet-cleaning subterfuge. Either your
husband accedes to having a stranger in your bathroom, or you hand him a
bucket, a brush, and a bottle of Scrubbing Bubbles.

—Prudie

There is also a letter about a girl at a sleepover who was woken by a man tickling her (WHAT?) and one about a racist child care provider.